How i sent a letter to London for free

It was a normal day in the city of Zurich and I needed to go and pick up a few post stamps to send out some thank you cards. On this day, I found out the only way to send a letter to London for free.

The man that served me was barely friendly and quite frankly he just wanted to get his job done and probably go home. I kindly asked for 70 post stamps and he handed a pack to me and I paid, threw them into my handbag and rushed for the tram. My day went on as usual and in the evening when I sat down to put the stamps on the letters I noticed something that surprised me. The man had given me way more than I had paid for. Instead of 7 packs of 10 stamps worth CHF70, he had handed me, a complete stranger 7 packs of 100 post stamps worth CHF700.

Immediately I decided that I would take the rest of the stamps back to the man the next day and I hoped that he would be working at the same location so that I could give them back to him directly. To my delight, I saw him as soon as I walked into the store and he was busy serving other customers. The counter next to his was free and someone offered to help me but I kindly declined and told them that I wanted to speak to the other operator who overheard me and looked more annoyed than anything. When he was finally free I walked up to him and he asked how he could help me and I told him that I had brought back stamps much to his confusion. I explained to him that I had come in the previous day to buy 70 stamps, which he said he remembered and was wondering if I had got less than 70. I handed him 630 stamps back and told him he had given me way too many. The man was literally dumbfounded for a few seconds and kept staring at me much to my discomfort. He then uttered a few thousand thank you’s. I felt really great about myself, I had been useful and kind and felt really satisfied with my deed.

When he got over his shock I asked him if I could send a letter to London and took out my wallet so that I could pay for it. He looked at me and said, “after all this, how can I even accept your payment for a letter?” I just smiled and thanked him. A letter that would have normally cost me about CHF3 was totally free. What more could I have asked for :). When I walked out, I had a bounce in my step and a smile on my face because I had done something that I felt was honorable.

Moral of the story is this, if you get too many post stamps, take them back, you might just get to send a letter to London for free 🙂 When you do get to send the letter for free, then I Hope You Dance.